


Brotherhood

by VereorInHell



Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Actually related Fíli and Kíli, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Athlet Fíli, Balin is a deputy, Bofur is a social worker, Foster Care, Fíli and Kíli Brotherly Love, Fíli's foster family is amazing, I mean there is if you squint, Memories Coming Back, Orphan Fíli, Orphan Kíli, Slash very slightly mentioned, The Hobbit References, Thorin is a sheriff, Unrelated Fíli and Kíli, fili x kili, kinda soulmates au, mainly platonic - Freeform, outcast kili, teenage Fili and Kili
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-15
Updated: 2019-07-15
Packaged: 2020-06-29 02:15:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19820467
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VereorInHell/pseuds/VereorInHell
Summary: Phil finds a brother he didn't know he was missing, and a life he didn't know he'd forgotten.Or: Kyle  finally finds a loving foster family, and it comes with a package: a brother and a past life he didn't know he's lived.Or even: The Dissons adopt a second child, and, was it fate?





	Brotherhood

**Author's Note:**

> Modern AU with a slight twist. No durincest, just brotherly love.

Kyle doesn’t move. His body feels heavy, and he’s tired. There is nowhere he can go.

xxxx

Phil is tired. Exhausted, really. He’s run as many laps of the perimeter as his coach has told him to, barking the order in shouts and shrill whistles.

The sky is heavy with grey clouds, full of rain that doesn’t want to come, yet. The ground is dusty and the grass yellow and dry, begging for water. There is electricity in the air: it makes the hairs on his arms and legs stick up, like the fur of a cat petted the wrong way.

He showers and dresses, ignoring the cramps in his legs, and the way his arms, shoulders and entire back are screaming in pain.

Phil is the best quarterback the coach has ever seen, but the old man doesn’t exactly go easy on him. A young athlete must suffer, must be prepared. The old man wants to hone Phil into perfection.

Phil is usually ok with that, even grateful for the chance he’s given. He wants to be a good athlete, he wants to be the best. He strives for perfection, if only to crush this annihilating feeling of never being enough, and never belonging, not really, not entirely.

He’s good looking, has good grades, is a good son and he assumes he is also a good friend, since his mates never refuse his company. But. Something is not right. Something is missing, and hell be damned, he doesn’t know what or why.

He falls in the car and drives home, praying god not to let him fall asleep before he’s made it to the front door.

Xxxx

Kyle is tired. Hungry. Hurting. Cold. Tired.

He’s damp, sweat drenching his shirt and sticking his hair to his forehead. He doesn’t even know why he is so wet, with no rain fallen in weeks. It’s like he’s fallen in a pool. And, despite the blackouts in his memory, he knows he hasn’t.

He catches his breath and runs till he collapses against the front door of the office where his social worker lives. He can’t knock: he faints before. It doesn’t matter: Bob is a pretty smart guy, he’ll find him, and he’ll know Kyle needs another foster family.

Hopefully, next one won’t suck as terribly as the last. He’s tired of running.

Xxxx

Robert Bob Daven is 32, single and very dedicated to his work. The kids he is responsible for are his first, second and third priority.

When he finds Kyle unconscious on his doorstep he carries him to his car and drives him to the hospital, even knowing that the current foster family Kyle has run from will not pay for his care.

He drives thinking, I have to find a new family for him. Bob is running out of options: he’s sent Kyle to all the remaining families on his list.

‘Maybe I should reconsider my policy of never assigning two kids to the same family’, he thinks.

Kyle has gone through a lot of shit. A huge pile of it. It’s like bad luck follows him. Every time, Bob thinks the new family will be ok, and then Kyle shows up with cigarette burns or missing too much weight.

No kids deserves that, and especially not Kyle. Kyle was a very cool and nice kid, when his biological parents passed away, and, after the natural period he’s spent sad and mourning, he went back to the very pleasant person his parents have grown him to be. With all his nightmarish experience he’s going through because of terrible foster families, Bob is very, very surprised to see that the kid hasn’t changed too much, yet. He hopes things stay this way, and feels angry with himself, for not being able to find a stable environment for him to live.

All the other kids Bob has had to assign to families are safe. They’ve all found families that turned out to be a loving environment, a place where they could focus on the good things of life. They are all fine, studying or working or still too young to be able to read, but still very much loved anyway. Bob keeps track of them and regularly checks on their effective wellbeing. He’s careful and dedicated to his mission like that. It isn’t about pride, it’s about giving to children the chances they deserve.

And it’s frustrating, because, all of them are safe, happy and even successful. Not even one year ago one of Bob’s first cases defended her PhD thesis at Berkeley University, for fuck sake! And here Kyle is, to whom no family can be found. To whom all this shit keeps happening.

They have instituted a secret telephone line, after that horrible time Kyle run to him with cigarette burns and cracked ribs. Bob knew the world was mean, but, that was the first time he witnessed how mean it could be. He has personally purchased a satellite phone for him, to keep secret and use in case of emergency. He had hoped Kyle wouldn’t need it. Using it once would have been one time too much for Bob’s tastes. Unfortunately, that phone has been used even more than once.

Bob parks at the ER and picks Kyle up, carrying him bridal style to the front desk. The nurse sees him and frowns with a sad, angry expression.

“Again, Bob?”

He hands Kyle over to another nurse. They check him, while Bob calls officer Fundinson to inform him of another flop.

“I swear Bob, this poor kid. I will end up adopting him myself!” Barth Fundinson comments, his usually placid tone replaced by a sad and frustrated one.

Bob can relate to that.

“I know Barth, I know” he says.

He does. He does, because he has already checked if there were laws against the possibility of a social worker personally adopting a kid entrusted to their care. There aren’t, though studies suggest against it. So he keeps looking for a foster family.

“I will call the family now” Bob says.

“What have they done to him to make him run away? Do you already know?” Barth Fundinson asks.

“I’ve seen a nasty bruise on his face, I’m not leaving him with people who punch kids. These guys didn’t even manage to pass the first test week, for heaven’s sake” Bob comments, frustrated and angry.

“They looked so fucking different when they applied and showed up…”

“They all do, those who wants Kyle, don’t they” officer Fundinson comments: “don’t bother calling them. If they’ve hit Kyle, they probably aren’t being overly nice to their own biological kids. I’ll talk with the sheriff, we might have to check personally”

Bob is very relieved to hear this. And not only because sheriff Thor Oakenfield is a scary motherfucker who never hesitates taking prompt action with cases of child abuses, threating them not much differently than violence in the streets or homicides.

Ironically, Kyle’s stream of bad luck with foster families has allowed Sheriff Oakenfield to find out all the child abusers that were hiding behind respectable facades.

Bob sighs. Kyle needs another family, and he’s reached the end of his last of suitable candidates with his last assignment. Since Kyle, Bob has had to rely on a list made up of entirely new people, and who turned out to be only after money. He doesn’t know what to do: there is no one left.

‘Should I pass him to a colleague in another city? But then he would have to move…’

“I’m starting to consider sending him to a family that has already taken in another child. I don’t see any other option, beside passing him over to someone in another city. Which I would rather avoid”

“Yes, Bob, I would avoid it, too. Come on, there must be a family who can take him in, even if they have already given shelter to another one” Barth argues in his most reasonable tone.

Bob nods, thinking.

“I didn’t want to overload them, but..”

“You ask them, Bob. They can all still refuse, if they aren’t sure they can do a decent job”

“Who’s that?” Bob hears a voice, asking from under Barth’s.

Sheriff Thor Oakenfield. Barth briefly updates him and Bob can hear the heavy sigh, and knows the sheriff his shaking his head.

“Put me on speaker, Barth. Bob, do you hear me?”

“Yeah, sheriff. Hi”

“Hi. Look. Let’s do this another time. Let’s give it one last try, with one of the families you already know. Put him in a place that we can be sure it will be good for him”

Bob nods.

“Yeah” he says, staring deep at the white wall of the hospital: “I will”

Xxxx

Bob types a number and hits call.

The Dissons have had Phil since… years. They adopted him when he was still a very, very tiny baby. They are also one of the best families Bob has ever met.

“Ah, hello Mr. Disson! Hi, this is Bob Daven. Yes, exactly, that’s me. How is Philip? No, actually, I was calling because I wanted to speak with you about another topic….”

Xxxx

When Phil arrives home, he can hear his dad talking somberly with his mother, closed behind the door of the office. He frowns: they sound worried, and he’s old enough they have started to let him participate, or at least witness, to the serious talking that involve the family life. And he likes to know why they are worried, when they are. He likes to help.

So he frowns and knocks on the door, even if he is really tired and wants only go upstairs and sleep for the next three days.

His father tells him to come in.

They look worried. He frowns more.

“Hey. What’s up? What’s wrong?”

His mother smiles from her armchair. She looks serious and worried, but also down to business. Which is exactly how Kate Disson looks when she tackles important topics. But she also shakes her head, as if to say, don’t ask.

Phil frowns more.

“What? Come on, what’s wrong? Can I help? I’m sure I can help”

His mother smiles at his father, and Jake Disson, stood near his son, shakes his head, fond and proud, and sighs.

“Phil, sit down. There is something we need to talk about”

Phil does, anxiety skyrocketing every passing second.

“Oh, Jake, if you say it like that, he will worry for sure!” Kate Disson comments, slightly scolding her husband: “Don’t worry, Phil. We just want to ask your opinion. Mr. Daven has just called…”

Xxxx

Maybe this is what he felt was missing.

Xxxx

Phil goes to bed with his head full of thoughts. Mainly they are questions, and questions he doesn’t have answer to.

His biological parents died when he was an infant, and he has no memory of them. For him, the Dissons are the only parents he has ever head, and he basks in their pride like if he was their biological son, too. They’ve raised him like their own flesh and blood, after all. They have shaped him in more ways than anyone else.

Yes, it had hurt, learning the truth, but he must admit that even when they told him they had been great. And they love him, they love him and show it even more than the average parent does. At least from what he sees in his friends’ families.

They know he feels something in his life is missing, and they do all they can to help him smothering this terrible feeling. Whatever they can, they do.

And now they told him they might want to consider the idea of giving him a brother.

“Maybe this can help you” Kate Disson said.

“But we don’t want you to think that you are not enough for us. Because you are” she has also remarked, stressing it while fixing Phil with one of her famous hard stare: “You are our son, we are your parents. But maybe, maybe having a brother can help you”

“This kid needs someone, too” Jake Disson explained: “Mr. Daven said… oh, Phil, you don’t want and don’t need to know the mess this poor kid has gone through. And he’s already fifteen, only one year younger than you. It might help you two bonding”

The implicit ‘and he will never bond with us and see us as his parents as you do, notwithstanding how loving with him we will be’ was clear enough Phil understood it.

The new kid is bound to always feel misplaced, wherever he’s sent. Even with great foster parents like the Dissons, he will always feel the adopted kid. And if Phil, who has been with the Dissons for so long he can pretend they are his biological parents, if Phil still feels this horrible, churning hole in his soul, this feeling of not belonging… he cannot imagine how worse it must be, for the other kid.

It would have been so selfish, to say no. To refuse, and stay forever the only one to bask in the Dissons’ love and affection. They would have let him, he knows, he could have told them, no, I don’t want to share you two, and they would have gone on exactly as before.

But he couldn’t. and maybe his mother was right: maybe this horrible feeling of not belonging, not being enough, not having a meaning, maybe it will go away, once he could share life with a brother.

He’s always wondered how having a brother would feel.

Xxxx

Kyle wakes up. He recognizes the hospital in three seconds, given how many times he’s woken in a hospital room in the past year or so.

‘I guess Bob must already be looking for another family’ he thinks, shifting in the bed.

He feels tired, but normal tired, not as groggy as he would feel if they had given him morphine or painkillers. The nurses will surely come and check on him soon, he knows from past experience.

He feels bored, not even angry anymore. Another failure, another family that turned out to be a bunch of liars.

He’s past the stage where he would feel disappointed, scared, angry, even doubt himself to be somewhat the cause for this result. No, he’s just bored. He wishes he was eighteen already, so he didn’t have to go through this pantomime again. Bob means well, but…

He just wants to sleep. For a moment, he wonders what will Bob do, now that they have reached the end of the list of candidates for Kyle’s adoption. After all, the trend is that the following family is always either worse or, at best, stable negative. He considers worrying. The devil you know and all that….

Then he sighs and turns in the bed.

Who cares. Who cares, who cares.

He’s tired.

Xxxx

“You know you don’t have to blame yourself, Bob. I’m not blaming you” Kyle says.

Bob is sitting by the side of his hospital bed. The social worker has one of the saddest look in his eyes Kyle has ever seen on him.

“Yes, because you are too good for this world” the man replies.

Kyle smirks.

“I guess people can’t see that, then”

Xxxx

Bob is very, very grateful that all the failures don’t tarnish Kyle’s innate good humor. Still, he feels guilty for this flop. For all of them. For the scars on the kid’s body, for the weight lost and never exactly recovered, for the bags under his eyes.

At least, he thinks, at least he trusts the Dissons. At least he knows they can be trusted. At least he knows that, should something happen, they will not harm Kyle, just politely explain they cannot keep a second child.

But they have accepted now, and Mr. and Ms. Disson always follow through.

Philip must have agreed as well.

Bob is sure, fiercely so, that the Dissons will not disappoint him.

Xxxx

They don’t disappoint him.

At their first, introductory meeting with Bob but without Kyle, they insist bringing Phil as well. This is a bit unusual, but Bob doesn’t argue against it.

Phil is a smart, nice kid, and he’s not reacting as selfishly as Bob knows he could. He sounds actually more focused on his soon to become younger brother, asking about Kyle, about his reaction at being sent to yet another family, another home. He asks if there are topics they should avoid, what they should know he doesn’t like.

He asks how long he has to wait before he can call him ‘brother’.

Bob is struck speechless after that. He’s actually silent, too stunned for words, for so long that the Dissons have the actual time to figure out why. Then they start arguing, almost angry (Ms. Disson) or amused (Mr. Disson), stating that, once the trial time is over, they will consider Kyle one of them. Kate Disson remarks more than once that actually, once Kyle tells her that he agrees that she be his foster mother, she will feel his actual mother, period. Right after he tells her ‘yes’.

“I don’t really give a damn of the trial period. If he tells me he’s ok at being my son, he is my son”

“What Kate means, Mr. Daven, is that, unless Kyle doesn’t like us, we will consider him a part of the family, as any other of us”

Bob still can’t speak.

A part of him is struggling not to ask how the fuck do they expect Kyle not to like, or want, them.

Xxxx

“You have already met him at school, Phil” Kate Disson exclaims, starting to lose her patience with her currently only child, soon to be first son. Who is so unbelievably anxious at the idea of becoming soon an elder brother that he is becoming very, very annoying.

“But I don’t remember anyone with that name! What is he was in one of my classes and it turns out I’ve never noticed him for years, that would be a terrible start!”

“Phil, he can’t be in one of your classes, he’s one year younger than you” Jake Disson intervenes, hugging his wife’s shoulders with an arm and his son’s with the other: “relax”

“…fine. But what if it turns out he was in team, that would be even worse!”

“Philip Disson I swear!” Kate shouts, and her husband laughs.

“Sorry, I’m sorry mom” Phil starts chanting sheepishly, hiding his face in the small of her shoulder.

“Seriously, calm down!”

“Yeah, I know, mom, sorry” he hugs her to sooth her frustration away, and she starts petting and combing her fingers through his hair.

“I understand you’re nervous, but calm down” she repeats, now in a soft and sweet, but still reasonable, voice.

“I know what we need to distract ourselves!” Jake Disson exclaims: “Pizza! We must go for pizza!”

Xxxx

The Dissons have pizza.

Xxxx

Kyle skips his hospital dinner and sleeps through the night in his hospital bed. The next day he can leave and goes directly to school, stopping at Bob’s to shower and change. The social worker isn’t there, he is fetching Kyle’s (few) things from the house where his last foster family lives.

They should have stuck to their rule of moving his stuff only after the trial period, really.

Xxxx

Kyle goes to school. He doesn’t bother hiding the shiner on his face. The assholes who bully him always notice this kind of things, so, why bother. Someone laughs after him for that, when they see it. Someone don’t, because it’s becoming a boring recurrence.

Kyle doesn’t even register the nasty words they throw after him.

Who cares.

Xxxx

Phil is… tense.

To be more precise he is: anxious, nervous, agitated, on edge, jittery, jumpy, aaaand excited.

Not the good kind of excited. Well, not in the ‘I’m turned on’ sense.

He’s a fucking mess, is what he is.

His hands are sweaty, and god, does he hate clammy hands. Can’t grab anything with sweaty palms. He’s sweating under his heavy leather jacket, and leaving wet handprints on the strap of his backpack, and on the chin of his helmet.

“Hey Phil!”

His friends are waiting for him at his locker. They’re good guys, mainly from the football team.

“You ok, man? You look nervous” their kicker asks.

He shakes his head and doesn’t explain. Can’t, really. None of them is close enough to him to tell them he’s going to become an elder brother, that very afternoon. He steer the conversation towards other, safer topics, while he busies himself silently skimming the crowd.

He knows Kyle is a brunet. He knows he’s like this tall, slim and somewhat pale. Still. He didn’t imagine there were so many people in school that fit that description.

He tries to spend his day as normally as he can, but at the same time can’t stop trying to identify Kyle, trying to find him. He’s tempted to google ‘Kyle Oakseed’ and look the guy up in social media, but he doesn’t, only because he’s promised his mother that he would not obsess over spotting Kyle.

He goes to class, takes notes, laughs at his friends and commiserates Trevor when he starts complaining about his new girlfriend.

He’s walking in the corridors when he sees Kevin Tren, a snob, posh senior who enjoys life only when he can act superior and bully people. Phil hates the guy and the guy hates him back. The only reason why this hasn’t escalated yet is that Kevin is the son of a very rich and politically influent judge, who wouldn’t like his son to lower himself to be involved in fights with common people. And Phil, well, Phil has been brought up a gentleman: fight to help people, otherwise no violence.

They hate each other's guts, and Phil often intervenes, stopping Kevin from bullying or harming people. And Kevin can’t retaliate, since Phil is just as popular, perhaps even more than him. Not so much because Phil is an athlete and Kevin an actor, but actually because Kevin is more feared than liked.

Kevin, or better, the two bulls that he brings along and act as his bodyguards have cornered a guy (brunet and pale, Phil’s brain notices), and they’ve already raised their fists.

The teachers are far enough for Phil and his friends to deem safe intervening. A few punches fly and Kevin, untouched because he lets his bodyguards fight for him, walks away with his goons covered in bruises. Phil is unharmed but some of his friends are sporting some nasty bruises, but all in all they fare much better.

They laugh, watching Kevin storm away, seething.

Phil doesn’t pay attention to the way his friends are mimicking Kevin’s angry retreat. He’s focused on the kid, and reaches out to the guy to check him up.

Brunet, pale. Like this tall. Long hair, although not as long as Phil’s, and untied. The guy has dark eyes, a very, very tired expression and a bruise on his face.

Phil winces: “Oh man, I’m sorry, I wish we’ve arrived sooner”

The kid laughs bitterly, shaking off Phil’s inquiring fingers from his face.

“Don’t worry, that wasn’t from them”

Phil frowns, stomach churning. God, does he hate parents who hit children. He hates people who hit children. Hates people who hit people, period, actually.

He doesn’t want to pry and push the guy with questions he clearly doesn’t want to answer to, but he can’t exactly help the frown that blooms on his face.

“You alright then?”

“Yeah. Thanks for showing up and helping”

“Any time” Phil smiles.

The somewhat annoyed look on the guy’s face lifts, and he smiles back.

“I’m Philip” Phil says, offering his hand.

The guy shakes it.

“Kyle”.

Xxxx

The world stops spinning.

‘Is it a coincidence?’ Phil asks himself.

His smile dims a bit. He’s still holding the guy’s (Kyle’s) hand. He takes a step closer.

“Kyle, you said?”

The guy nods: “Yep”

Phil smiles “I’m Phil”

“Yeah, you’ve just said it” the guy comments, smirking.

King of sass, this Kyle.

“No, I mean, I’m Phil Disson”

He can see the moment it clicks into place, when Kyle’s eyes dilate in realization and he goes slightly rigid. They’re still holding hands, standing a bit closer than what you would normally do with a stranger.

“Oh” Kyle says, sass completely disappeared: “I’m.. I’m Kyle Oakseed”

Phil laughs.

Xxxx

Kyle is an idiot.

But Phil is a nice guy, and his laugh doesn’t sound or look malicious. It’s more as if the guy is trying to save Kyle from dying from embarrassment, possibly even laughing at himself for his own figure.

Kyle can’t believe this.

He was supposed to leave school and meet this guy and his parents in one hour. He was supposed to go and show up and not have a clue who those people were, his possibly-soon-to-be foster family.

And here is the guy who is supposed to become his older brother.

Kyle is speechless. Which, even if he’s grown into the quiet type, it’s still a rare occurrence, because, sarcasm, sarcasm is a way of life, and sarcasm always needs to be voiced.

No sarcasm comes up to mind now, though.

“I guess you couldn’t wait” Kyle says, after a while.

He immediately starts regretting saying it – stupid comment, why did you say that, now you made him looks bad – when Phil just smiles again. This guy looks like a sunflower, all blond and radiant and big shiny smile. Seriously, what’s his deal. How do you do that.

“Big brother duty was calling!” He honestly replies.

Kyle looks at him, stunned and speechless, again.

Then he smiles back.

What the hell is he supposed to say to that.

Xxxx

“So….” Phil starts, letting go of Kyle’s hand.

“Do you want to go together?” he asks.

Kyle frowns: “Go where?”

Then it dawns on him that Phil means the meeting they have in one hour, with Bob and Phil’s parents. Who are going to become Kyle’s parents, too. Maybe. That would be the plan, at least.

Kyle feels … betrayed. His usually pretty decent brain activity has obviously deserted him, and now he’s left here to look like an idiot.

He hasn’t processed yet that the young athlete in front of him, the definition of a jock, nice smile and pretty face (and a bunch of bulky friends nearby who look very fond of him if they’ve risked detention for him) is the guy who is going to be his older brother.

That this is the guy who gave the Dissons the final green light to go for adopting Kyle. The one who had the ultimate power to refuse and be selfish and just keeping his happy family to himself.

Phil Disson, sixteen years old and the embodiment of a ray of sunshine, explicitly agreed, even requested having a brother.

Kyle beats his eyelashes. He’s pretty sure anyone else would have said no. Especially if they’ve been adopted themselves, too. But, even if they hadn’t. Why would you want to share you perfectly stable family and bring a wild card in, completely unknown?

But this guy here, he said yes.

And now he wants to go to the meeting with Kyle.

To go meet his parents. Who are potentially going to become very soon Kyle’s parents, too.

What the fuck is Kyle supposed to say and do?

Phil Disson is still looking at him as if he knows that Kyle has figured it out, but he answers anyway.

“To the meeting, later” he says, and thank god he doesn’t say ‘to meet my parents’ because boy, would that be awkward.

Kyle fidgets, opens his mouth, jaw moving up and down, open and close without being able to utter a word. Which is terrible because Phil interprets it as a sign he must have stepped over Kyle’s lines and he tries to backpedal, face going suddenly all panicky. “…or not, or not, maybe you don’t want”

“I do” Kyle blurts out, interrupting Phil’s stream of words, trying to save the situation from escalating to stellar levels of awkwardness.

Phil’s mouth shuts in a second, then he smiles, all warm and happy, a puppy, really: “Yeah?” he echoes.

Kyle nods.

“Yeah. Sure, why not”

Like it’s no big deal.

What the actual fuck, brain!!

Phil beams anyway, ignoring the awkwardness that has actually increased thanks to Kyle’s attempt at diffusing it. He insists that Kyle joins his friends for lunch, introduces him to every single one of them. Then he stops, freezes and half turns to him, starting to ramble that maybe Kyle didn’t want to join them and would rather stay with his own friends.

Kyle doesn’t have friends. Not here, at least. Not in school. And those who are, well, they’re not close enough he’d like to have lunch with them. So he just lifts up a hand, interrupting Phil, and says it’s ok.

Phil beams and goes on with the introductions. His friends look at him and Kyle as if they are thinking they should be used to Phil’s weirdness, picking up completely strangers just like that, and at the same time like they know something is on with Kyle, because Phil might be weird but he’s never picked up strays from alleys.

They don’t ask, anyway.

Kyle follows Phil. They follow Phil.

A leader of people, this Phil, Kyle muses, with a smile.

Xxxx

Kyle loves people. He’s always been a very friendly person. Of course, going through the shit his foster families have put him through, his friendliness has somewhat dimmed, but he still considers himself quite a friendly person. It might take a bit longer for him to bond with someone, but.

And, it doesn’t happen with Phil. He feels so weirdly attracted into Phil’s orbit that for it takes longer than usual for his paranoia sense to kick in. Developed and honed thanks to his negative experiences with past foster families, he starts with all the kind of negative thoughts that could be thought. Like, how this could be all a scheme, how Phil could be after something, how maybe he wants to fool him, or humiliate in front of everyone for daring asking to be adopted by his family, maybe even planned and staged Kevin’s aggression and him coming to the rescue.

‘Ok, brain, chill’ he tells himself after a while, when he looks at Phil’s face and he sees the love child of a sunray and an overexcited puppy.

This guy looks purer than water, with his warm and happy smiles that warm Kyle up from within, too, and he looks like he’s sincerely already growing attached to Kyle. To the idea of a maybe-younger-brother, at least. Whether that has specifically anything to do with Kyle is still unclear, but, still quite a big step in the right direction. Right?

He tells himself, don’t be negative. He can almost hear Bob telling him the same, reminding him not to give up, to keep hoping for the best.

After all, his biological family was pretty cool, and his real parents were even more than just decent people. After all his bad luck, maybe the Dissons are going to be the family that proves to Kyle he can go back to live in a normal environment. At least normal, if not a loving one.

Maybe.

Xxxx

Lunch with Kyle is weird but amazing.

Phis feels so warm he could burst. He keeps looking at the kid with all his hope in his eyes, and, even if he hasn’t uttered a word to any of his friends, by the time the lunch is over they’ve all figured out there is something between him and the new guy.

Phil feels a bit bad for not telling them why, not yet, but, call him paranoid. He doesn’t want to tell them yet.

Worst case scenario, they’ll think he’s gone gay for the kid.

Xxxx

The meeting goes well.

It’s terribly awkward and even embarrassing, until Kate Disson removes her bag from her lap, pushes up the sleeves of her blouse and states with the most straightforward voice ever their intention of adopting him.

She goes about it with the subtlety of a hammer, and tells Kyle that it’s ok if he doesn’t want or like them, but, otherwise, she doesn’t want a trial period. As far as they are concerned, she says, Kyle is already one of them. Unless he doesn’t want to.

Phil blushes and looks aghast: “Mom! You promised you wouldn’t go bulldozer mode with him!”

“Nonsense” she replies, hand shaken in the air to better push aside the comment. But she’s blushing, as if she isn’t sure being so direct was a good idea.

It’s that blush that makes Kyle melt, all his paranoia and worries, now high and rampant, disappear.

“Ok” he says.

Phil beams at him.

Bob raises an eyebrow in a impressed and somewhat slightly suspicious way. Kyle can understand why: he’s never agreed so fast. He knows better than to give his assents(or dissent) in such a short time.

Jake Disson chuckles: “Don’t let her scare you into doing what she says, kyle!”

It’s a joke, but with a very serious undertone. Kyle appreciates. He also likes Mr. Disson, even if he doesn’t know why. It’s not because he’s being kind to him. It must be in the way he behaves with Phil, too.

Kate Disson scowls at her husband for the joke, but when she looks again at Kyle there is a hint of insecurity in her eyes, right over her smile.

“Are you sure?”

Under the table, Phil’s hands are clutched into fists so tight, the knuckles have gone white. He’s biting his lower lip to stop from smiling, but somewhat failing miserably.

Kyle decides to give in to hope, for once after a long time. He hopes he won’t come to regret trusting them.

“Yeah” he repeats.

Xxxx

Phil jumps out of his chair, knocking it down and not caring in the least. He screams in joy, like his favorite football team has won the match of the matches. He engulfs Kyle in a massive bear hug that almost cracks one of the younger kid’s ribs.

Kyle is about to voice his discomfort, even if muscle memory makes he return the hug just as fiercely.

Something in the proximity of Phil’s body, blond hair obscuring his vision and Phil’s voice chanting something right under his ear makes his eyes water, and he doesn’t know why.

Then he notices what Phil is whispering.

“I have a brother, I have a brother, oh my god I have a brother, Kili..”

Kyle’s heart clenches and stops. When it starts again, he doesn’t feel the tears swelling in his eyes. The name is a punch in the stomach and makes his brain short circuit. He hides his face in Phil’s neck, and the tears start rolling.

He clutches one hand at the base of Phil’s nape, feeling the blond strands and grabbing onto them.

“Fili” he whispers back, just as silent as Phil is: “Fili” he repeats.

“I’ve found you brother” Phil mouths against Kyle’s shirt, unheard by the chattering, cheering adults in the room.

“I’ve found you” Phil repeats.

“Fili” is all that Kyle can say.

Xxxx

Bob is surprised at the boys’ reaction, from both sides. He has never witnessed such an emotional response to a family adopting a kid.

This feels more like a reunion, two people that have been apart for so long finally coming together again, like two siblings who’ve known each other for all their lives and are finally brought together.

Which can’t be, because he’s checked their backgrounds dozens, hundreds of times and he is sure that these boys have never had anything to do with each other.

And yet this is the first time he sees this pure love, this raw emotion bursting so suddenly from two kids who have been told they’ll be siblings.

He makes himself the note of checking again into their past, and to keep an eye on them. Has he forgotten something, has he missed anything at all? But how could he? This is the reaction you have for something way too big to stay hidden…

He leads the Dissons in the other room, where he has all the necessary documentation laid out and ready for their signature. He’s hoped for a positive reaction, knowing the Dissons, so everything is basically all ready.

He’s hoped for the best, but, he could have never imagined the boys would react like this.

Xxxx

Kyle (Kili, his mind supplies) doesn’t know how long they stay like that, wrapped into each other.

They stop crying at some point, but they don’t dare let the other one go, and they can’t speak. If Phil (Fili) feels anywhere close to what Kyle is going through right now, it’s hardly a surprise that they don’t speak: too many words, too many images, memories, concepts, feelings are spinning in his head, and he can barely breath.

Kyle isn’t even sure that all his thoughts actually belong to him. He doesn’t know why hearing Phil (Fili) call him ‘Kili’ has apparently uncovered a pandora boxes of memories in his mind, pouring out memories of pain and elder brothers dying in front of him.

Are these his memories? They are his memories. He can see himself in them. It’s like flashes of a past life, one that he has lived. He, himself, he as Kyle, only, with a different name. One where Phil was his brother and called Fili and died for him.

“Kili” Phil – Fili mutters again.

“Fili” Kyle – Kili whispers back.

“What the fuck is happening to us?” Phil – Fili asks, in a low voice that doesn’t do nothing to hide how scared he feels.

“I don’t know” Kyle – Kili admits, feeling just as scared.

“Are these memories? Are you seeing weird stuff too? Is this, what, a past life?” Phil – Fili asks frantically, hands clutching Kyle – Kili even closer.

Kyle – Kili squeezes back, just as hard. He doesn’t have the slight intention of letting go.

“…I think it is” he answers.

He opens his eyes, if only to stop the stream of images of an armored Phil – Fili being killed in front of him. His gaze lands directly on Phil’s blond hair, the lock hit by the sunlight filtering through the window.

“… We weren’t even human” Phil – Fili mutters, in astonishment, realization and possibly even denial.

“I know” Kyle - Kili says.

“And we died” Phil – Fili whispers again.

“You died for me” Kyle – Kili whispers back, caressing the blond hair and resting one hand on the back of Phil’s head.

“You died for me”

Xxxx

Phil (Fili?) doesn’t say anything.

He did. He’s died for Kyle. When Kyle was Kili. Was he? Has he ever even been a Kili?

He doesn’t remember much, his brain is full with too much information and it’s still all too messy to be called memories. Not enough order to be processed as memories.

It’s like they’re being injected directly into his brain, and it almost hurts.

All he knows, all he can feel sure of, is the utter joy and relief he feels and having found his brother.

Xxxx

The boys faint.

When Bob and the Dissons come back in the room to check on them and see why they haven’t answered when they called them, they find them sprawled on the floor, where they’ve must have collapsed still tangled in their bear hug.

The Dissons almost panic, Bob too. Way too creepy and unusual for his taste. They drive the boys to the hospital, and spend the night there. The Dissons spend the night sitting in chairs between the bed where their son rests, and where their second, newly acquired son sleeps.

The boys sleep through the night. Asleep, both turn their head toward the other, and Bob is speechless. Is this a coincidence?

When they wake up the morning after, there is a new light in their eyes, and neither he nor the Dissons can explain what it is. But whatever it happened it doesn’t seem to be affecting the boys in a negative way: they are healthy, the doctors say, and Phil steps up from his place in the bed and crushes into hugs both his parents.

Which is clearly weird, Bob understands from the slightly alarmed look the Dissons share with each other before returning the hug.

The Phil slips into Kyle’s be and hugs him, holding him until he wakes.

The Dissons don’t utter a word. They just look at Bob, looking stunned and speechless.

Bob can relate.

Boy, can he relate.

Xxxx

The memories have settled.

They remember.

Xxxx

Phil (he doesn’t want to call himself Fili in this life. He’s Phil now. He’s not a prince anymore) wants to burn his copy of The Hobbit, the pretty one that his mother has given him as a present when he was ten years old. Kyle (who similarly doesn’t want to think of himself as Kili anymore) stops him. They just hide it and decide never picking it up again.

The Dissons are very happy to see that, whatever has made their kids faint, at least they are over it. They are progressively growing more accustomed to the incredibly fast bond the teenagers have formed, and tell each other that, after all, better a weirdly fast bond than having them fight.

Bob is still suspicious, but all his researches turn up in nothing, so he gives up and embraces the positivity. He just hopes, in the back of his mind, that nothing bad will come by this impressive, almost excessive familiarity between the two brothers.

Xxxx

Kyle enters the team. He’s fast and knows Phil better than anyone else, even better than his teammates who have played with Phil for years. Because Phil still moves like Fili did, and, even after being apart for some time, Kyle is still Kili, so he knows his brother’s every move.

They tell their parents that they don’t need a second room, they would rather share one. Just put a second bed, mom, it’s ok. Yes, dad, a second table would be nice, too. In the end they sleep in the same one, together.

Phil starts remembering the last of his life as Fili. The pain of the sword penetrating flesh, and breaking bones, when Bolg used it to break his neck. Kyle hugs him, desperately trying to make the memories go away. He keeps calling him Phil, chanting the name in his brother’s ears as if to remind them that no Orc will find them here.

They are safe, they are alive, they are together.

Xxxx

“Phil”

Jake Disson call his son. Phil stops in his tracks (he was going to Kyle) and turns to the man.

“Yes dad?”

His dad is standing on the doorstep of his office room, leaning with an elbow against the wooden-covered wall.

“Is everything alright with Kyle?” he asks, serious even under his small smile.

Phil frowns: “Yes, sure. Why do you ask?”

Jake Disson shrugs. It’s a gesture that he does so frequently, it’s so typically ‘him’, that it’s been transmitted even into his adopted son.

Phil always finds it endearing.

“You have grown very protective of him, and very fast, your mother and I have been talking, especially after what Mr. Daven told us of Kyle’s past… we were wondering if you had turned into a protective big brother for a specific reason. Maybe you knew something”

Phil just stares. Then he mouths a ‘oh’, when he understands what the man is implying. They are asking him if Kyle is safe, if he’s ok, if his traumatic experiences with previous foster families is having repercussions of any kind on him.

They truly are good people, he thinks. For a moment, he has a flash of his dwarven parents, Kate Disson so similar to Dis, and Jake Disson so much like his previous father.

He smiles and shakes his head.

“No, nothing like that. I just feel like I’ve always known him, and I’m happy to have him back” he replies, trying to explain.

Jake Disson nods, even if Phil is sure he hasn’t managed to explain it very well.

“I’m glad to know that. And that you feel that way”

Phil beams and walks upstairs, where Kyle is waiting for him. The school books are piled on their desks, open and pointedly ignored; his younger brother is sprawled on the floor, propped up on cushions, and waves the joystick with impatience.

They play videogames until it’s dinner time, then they wrestle downstairs, and then they rush to put together whatever assignment they have.

Xxxx

They are lying on a grassy spot in the park, on a spring-warm afternoon. Phil is trying to braid Kyle’s untamed dark hair, although he keeps braiding and then undoing his work.

“I remember Dwalin” Kyle says.

Phil stops with hands in mid-air, still holding brunet strands. He pauses, then starts again.

“Do you remember Dwalin, Phil?” Kyle asks again.

“Of course I remember Dwalin, Kyle” Phil answers in a placid tone, braiding and braiding and then undoing it all again. It’s like petting a cat, really. And Kyle adores being on the receive end.

“And Balin, do you remember Balin?” Kyle asks again.

“I do” Phil answers: “And Gloin and Oin. And Ori, Nori and Dori. And even Bifur, Bofur and Bombur”

“…and uncle Thorin?” Kyle asks, trying to look up at Phil without turning.

“I remember him. As I remember mom and dad” Phil replies.

“You mean, the other ones”

“Yes, the other ones”

There is a somber look on Kyle’s face that doesn’t look good on his face. Like it’s completely foreign on him.

“As I remember the others. Gandalf, and Bilbo. And Bard the bargeman. Even the elves” Phil adds.

He starts another small braid and smirks: “I remember king Thrainduil, Legolas the pain in the ass, and a certain redhead capitain as well”

Kyle blushes: “…Yeah, I remember her too”

Phil smiles and pets his rother’s dark hair: “You really loved her”

Kyle nods, looking at nothing: “I did” he says, then he shifts and looks up at Phil, his expression serious: “But I didn’t come back for her, did I?”

Phil’s heart swells all of a sudden. Or maybe it explodes. Possibly it does both, it grows so hot it feels like a furnace, and then it burst like a bomb.

He melts like butter left under the summer sun.

“No? For whom did you, then?” he asks, a sly smile on his face.

Kyle grabs his hand, intertwining their fingers, and pushes his head backwards into Phil’s lap, until he can see his brother in the eyes; when he does, he smiles.

Phil blushes and smiles back. Then he sighs and lets go of the dark hair.

“You’ll never let me make a decent braid. Come on, let’s go practice” he suggests.

They go.


End file.
